the last six months it had seemed to him that a humble
path lay before him, following which he might again live a life of lowly
discipleship. He had repented with a bitter repentance, and out of the
depths into which he had fallen he had cried unto God and been
delivered. He believed that he had received God's forgiveness, as he
knew that he had received men's forgiveness. Out of the wreck of his
former life he had constructed a little raft and trusted to it bearing
him safely through what remained of the storm of life. If Felicita had
lived he would have remained in the service of his father's old friend,
proving himself of use in numberless ways; not merely as an attendant,
but in assisting him with the affairs of the bank, with which he was
more conversant, from his early acquaintanceship with the families
transacting business with it, than the stranger who was acting manager
could be. He had not been long enough in Riversborough to gain any
influence in the town as a poor foreigner, but there had been a hope
dawning within that he might again do some good in his native place, the
dearer to him because of his long and dreary banishment. In time he
might perform some work worthy of his forefathers, though under another
name. If he could so live as to leave behind him the memory of a sincere
and simple Christian, who had denied himself daily to live a righteous,
sober, and godly life, and had cheerfully taken up his cross to follow
Christ, he would in some measure atone for the disgrace Roland Sefton's
defalcations had brought upon the name of Christ.

This humble, ambitious career was still before him if he could forego
the joy of making himself known to his children--a doubtful joy. For
had he not cut himself from them by his reckless and despairing
abandonment of them in their childhood? He could bring them nothing now
but sorrow and shame. The sacrifice would be on their side, not his. It
needs all the links of all the years to bind parents and children in an
indestructible chain; and if he attempted to unite the broken links it
could only be by a knowledge of their mother's error as well as his. Let
him sacrifice himself for the last and final time to Felicita and the
fair name she had made for herself.

He was stumbling along in the dense darkness of the forest with no gleam
of light to guide him on his way, and his feet were constantly snared in
the knotted roots of the trees intersecting the path. So must he s